


Collaborations

by otterzest



Series: All These Abandoned Buildings [3]
Category: His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Alternate Universe - His Dark Materials Fusion, Gen, Miles "fellas is it gay to love your daemon" O'Brien, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Worldbuilding, daemon injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-29
Updated: 2020-03-29
Packaged: 2021-02-28 16:55:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23370553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/otterzest/pseuds/otterzest
Summary: Chief Engineer’s Log:I have been informed by Commander Sisko that I must keep this afternoon’s appointment with the Deep Space Nine Chief Medical Officer. I informed the Commander that there are still critical instabilities within the main transporter relay that require my urgent attention. The Commander then stated that Dr. Bashir’s project is of utmost importance to the quality of life on the station, and that my staff could handle the relay issue well enough on their own. Regardless of this nonsense, I predict I should be done with my meeting within the hour, and able to join my team and resume my work on actually important issues.Chief Medical Officer’s Log:This afternoon Commander Sisko informed me that my meeting has finally been arranged with Chief O’Brien, and we can finally go over my rudimentary aquatic daemon housing protocols. I have been looking forward to working with the Chief for quite some time, and I believe he will be impressed by what I have created so far! On a personal note, I believe this is finally my chance to make friends with my colleagues here on the station.... Miles O'Brien works with Dr. Bashir to complete a project.
Relationships: Julian Bashir/Miles O'Brien
Series: All These Abandoned Buildings [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1662244
Comments: 1
Kudos: 39





	Collaborations

[Sif](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFeD2O_OLbI%22) snorted as they entered the medical science lab. Adjacent to the infirmary, it was one of the many rooms on the station that had yet to be cleaned up and retrofitted to Federation standards; the lighting was dim, the climate controls still pumped out warm dry air, tables and benches were set just slightly higher than comfortable for the average humanoid. All in all, still very Cardassian, and it put a scowl on Miles’ face as they picked their way through the gloom to a table on the far side of the room.

Doctor “Call me Julian” Bashir was hunched over a table, rearranging test tubes in a plastic holding rack. He had somewhat optimistically scattered rechargable lanterns around the tabletop, giving his workspace adequate visibility but unfortunately further emphasizing the severe alien architecture that loomed up and around his small circle of light. Next to him, his [gangly oversized pigeon of a daemon](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qfoFcBLsCI&t=73s) was peering up at his work and the two were murmuring quietly back and forth.

Then he looked up, smiled, straightened up. “Chief! Thank you for joining me.” Bashir stepped back from the table. “I greatly appreciate your help with this matter.”

“Don’t mention it, only my job,” Miles gruffly replied. He moved aside one of the lights, set down his toolkit. 

“I didn’t want to take up too much space in the Infirmary, so I set up shop in here,” Bashir said, somewhat apologetically. He glanced around at the dark room. “It’s clean enough, but unfortunately the lighting -”

“It’s on the list to get fixed. Along with a million other things.” Sif shook out her fur in exaggerated irritation and sat at Miles’ heels. Bashir’s flamingo daemon - she had introduced herself, but Miles was damned if he could remember her name now - lowered her snakelike neck in greeting. Sif looked away.

If Bashir was offended he did not show it. He clasped his hands together. “So! I wanted to show you what I’ve cooked up, and wanted to ask if we could replicate this system on a larger scale.” He gestured his closed hands towards the test tubes, beakers, and small tank on the table in front of him. “Did you have a chance to look over the notes I sent?”

Miles actually had opened the document the previous evening, then set it down to play with Molly and Hiro. “I glanced at them.”He pulled a PADD out of his kit, “So remind me again - this is for the aquatic life support systems, right? Just for daemons, or -?”

“Currently our most pressing need is for daemons, but we can’t rule out aquatic races visiting the station and needing living accommodations,” Julian replied. “Right now we have several Federation officers and Bajoran civilians living here with water-dwelling daemons. They are either confined to their quarters with their tanks, or forced to carry around repurposed supply bins. They need to have better facilities, at least in their living spaces, and some method of carrying around enough water to keep them comfortable.”

“Nothing wrong with a good old fashioned bucket.” Miles investigated the tank. It was small, made out of clear acrylic, filled with water. A small filter box was clipped to one side, siphoning water and pouring it back out in a little waterfall. “What’s in here?”

“This is my prototype for a freshwater system. It’s small, but it meets the requirements for sterile water maintenance.” Bashir popped open the box on the side, pointed out various components. “As you read, the biggest priority in daemon water quality maintenance is the removal of smaller irritants: oils, dust, small pieces of detritus, even viruses and bacteria. From what I’ve gathered, UV sterilization is the most commonly used method, but for larger systems we should consider ozone. But this is just a smaller, portable system. Hypothetically -“ he snapped the case back shut “- this closed system could maintain sterile, potable water for weeks!” 

“Of course the saltwater systems are more tricky, but that’s why I need your help! Naturally there will be more mineral additives, which I anticipate will concentrate as the water slowly evaporates, so _these_ systems will need more water changes. I’ve read a decent amount about aquatic life support system management, but I wanted to get a professional’s opinion.”

He smiled at Miles, elbow resting on the chest-high tabletop, flamingo daemon leaning into his side. For a moment Miles fiercely envied his naïveté, his open excitement for life on the station. Unbothered by the swoops of Cardassian architecture, the dim light not reminding him of desperate skirmishes in dark hallways and phaser fire sizzling just past his ear. To Julian, this was just a station, just a room. 

The secondhand nature of Deep Space Nine was bothering Miles more than he had expected. He waved the thoughts away and heard Sif whine softly, and they both redirected their attention to the task at hand. 

“I just need to make a marine system prototype like this one, then monitor the water parameters and make sure the levels are holding steady. Then, we can start building the actual tanks for quarters and workspaces! For that, I need your help.”

Sif pressed her ears back, looked away from Bashir’s daemon. “To be honest, doctor,” Miles admitted, “I haven’t had to work with these that much. On the _Enterprise_ they had a life support crew that handled the systems, I mostly worked with the transporters.” 

“No problem, I still appreciate your knowledge!” The words were overly saccharine and could have sounded sarcastic, if the young man did not look as painfully sincere as he did. “Surely you had colleagues with aquatic daemons, though…?”

Miles scratched his head. “Honestly, I don't think I have. Not since I was a kid?” Sif then sat up and pawed at his leg, and recognition dawned on her human’s face. “Oh yeah! Maybe. I think someone on the _Enterprise_ had a fish of some sort…?”

The memory resurfaced, hazy and vague. _The transporter pad needed additional adjustments to account for the extra 12 ounces of water clipped to an arm or a belt. Security uniform, short blonde hair, a tiny iridescent fish that lunged and flared his fins at the other daemons -_

Miles suddenly felt a flush of guilt color his cheeks. He tried to remember everyone they had lost on the _Enterprise_ , and he usually did. To cover up his discomfort he bent down, picked Sif up, and set her on the counter. She sniffed at the tank, head tilted. “How long until we need to start building these tanks?”

“Ideally, the sooner the better. I would like to take a week or so to keep an eye on the water quality parameters.” Bashir picked up a rack of test tubes, filled them with water from the bubbling tank, and began to pipette different compounds into each sample. “But if we can agree on a design for the tanks, maybe your team could start building the physical components today!” 

The thought of spending his afternoon tediously replicating sheets of acrylic and sealing them together filled Miles with dread. Sif sent him a look - god knows how that transporter relay project was going without his help! - and she sighed in sympathy. Out loud, he asked, “Is all of this is really necessary? Not to be rude, but there are a lot of other issues on this station that need fixing.”

“It’s part of life support,” said Bashir, pipetting a vivid blue chemical into one of the test tubes, “So I would say it’s essential.” 

“Why not just replicate the water? That’s easy.”

“Because, Chief -” Bashir held the test tube up to the light, squinted at the color “ - replicators fail. Pretty frequently around here, too. Not to say that I don’t have total faith in your abilities to repair them-“ he cut in hastily as Sif growled in offense “- but as you said, there’s a lot of issues that need fixing, and your team can’t respond to replicator problems on top of everything else.” He set the tube down, typed a few values into his PADD.

“These kits are part of standard Federation emergency planning packs, for making almost any water supply potable. If we can train people to do this themselves, people with fish daemons won’t be at the mercy of the replicators.”

Miles shrugged. “Sure, I guess. I still don’t know why they need all this when they’ve been living just fine in a plastic bucket of tap water, though. We have plenty of water rations stockpiled from the Enterprise, have someone distribute them, problem solved.”

Bashir gave Miles a sardonic look. “Surviving is one thing, _living just fine_ is quite another.”

Miles frowned, leaned forward to rest his crossed arms on the countertop. “What’s that supposed to mean? They _are_ fine. Ensign Martin in engineering has their big frog thing in a case, carries it around with them, doing just fine.”

Bashir frowned. “One could argue that ‘just fine’ isn’t quite enough. Not setting our people up for success.”

“What? It’s just a daemon.” Miles screwed his face into a skeptical look and Sif trotted back to his side, sitting by his elbow. “She follows you around, talks, thinks - just as long as you stick together you’re alright!”

Bashir laughed and snapped the plastic cap onto the first test tube. “Chief, you _did_ take psychology classes at the Academy, correct? Biology? The basics, at least?”

Miles, already irritated by Bashir’s bottomless superiority, scowled. “Probably, but -”

“Do you remember learning about daemon health? What it does to a person’s mind? And vise-versa?”

“Well it’s not like they’re actual animals, right? They don’t eat. They’re made out of - whatever particles. Rusakov particles. Not flesh and blood.”

“No, but they mimic that flesh and blood very closely, sometimes _too_ closely.” Another colorful chemical - this one green - was added to a water sample. “And that impacts the neurochemistry in the physical brain, which in turn impacts the humanoid body. So when the daemon hurts, their humanoid hurts too.”

Sif scratched behind an ear. “We’ve never heard of this,” she said flatly, and Miles continued, “like how?”

“Have you never met anyone with an injured dæmon? It’s common enough, literature cites countless examples of dæmon injury comorbidity with psychological disorders. Anxiety, schizophrenia, PTSD -“

Miles flashed back to Captain Maxwell’s lanky coyote daemon, sitting immaculate and calm on the _Rutledge_ the day after Setlik, and then years later materializing on the Enterprise transport pad as a scarred and scabbed thing. As Maxwell and Miles remembered and sang she’d kept licking her front legs raw, desperately chewing as if she could reach the past by digging through her own skin and muscle - 

Sif licked Miles’ hand, breaking his reverie. She wagged her tail when he met her gaze, and he smiled back.

Bashir, oblivious, was still talking. “- so from a holistic wellness perspective, dæmon physical care is very important. A Federation station would have all this infrastructure built in, but out here we’re going to have to build things from scratch.” 

“Right, yeah.” Miles kneaded his right eye with the heel of a hand. “Where did you want to begin?”

“I want to prioritize the habitat ring, and focus on retrofitting quarters there. But I think our Federation facilities are also very important, of course.”

“If these tanks of yours work, how many will we need?”

Bashir consulted a PADD. “According to reports regarding Federation station staffing, we have eight people with aquatic daemons, three of which must live in water, the rest that need access to water. Species list includes -” he swiped down the page with a finger “ - a snowflake eel, a salamander, an american bullfrog - that’s your Ensign Smith - an angelfish, a parrotfish, and a pie-billed greebe.”

“A pie faced what?”

Bashir shrugged. “A type of bird. Odd looking thing, but who am I to talk?” The flamingo daemon honked, mock-offended.

Miles sighed. His memories of Maxwell were fading, and he was rediscovering his irritation with the young doctor. “Why on earth would a bird daemon need water?”

“Because they live in it, of course. Because they’re evolved to be in it.”

“It has feet, doesn’t it?” Interjected Sif. “It can stand and fly.”

“Of course, we should take care of the aquatic obligate daemons first. The greebe can hold out, but it’s still not ideal for him to be on solid ground all day.” 

Miles was still trying to visualize a bird that couldn’t stand on its own. Bashir, amused, continued, “You are pretty low maintenance, Chief.”

Miles bristled. “What the hell does that mean?”

Bashir raised his hands in an appeasing gesture. “Just because your daemon takes the form of a terrestrial mammal, with requirements similar to those of a terrestrial human, doesn’t mean every other daemon is as hardy. A lot need special accommodations. Celess, for example.” 

As if to demonstrate, Bashir stretched out a hand and his flamingo daemon wedged her bill between his fingers, nuzzling her face into his palm. “I have soft mats down in my quarters, so her feet don’t get hurt from standing on the hard ground all day. She isn’t built for that type of surface. And even then I occasionally soak her feet in a bath so that any little injuries can heal.”

The flamingo made a bleating noise, turned her head to nibble at Bashir’s fingers, and the doctor smiled at her. “It does wonders for us both.”

Miles snorted, crossed his arms again. Such a blatant display of daemon affection made him a little uncomfortable, but he wasn’t able to quite say why. “My parents never did stuff like that. Back in the old days people just had daemons around and that was that.”

“And how happy were they, because of that?” The flamingo stepped back, began to fastidiously preen at her long pink feathers.

“Happy enough!” Miles snapped. “Anyway that doesn’t matter. I’m here to approve your tank designs, right?”

“Of course.” Bashir looked a little taken aback, but his tone did not change. “I’ll send you a schematic for you to officially sign off, if you’re happy with what I’ve told you for the freshwater systems.”

“Yes, it’s fine.” Miles sighed again. “I’ll put together a team, and we can start building the first tank today.”

“Excellent!” The doctor grinned, genuinely enthusiastic. “I think this will make a real difference in Starfleet morale; no one wants to feel like their needs are being ignored!”

“How d’you mean, ignored?”

“In that, their needs aren’t being considered.” Bashir paused, then continued, “Isn’t your wife’s daemon a penguin?”

Miles hesitated. Yuki was a penguin - not one of the South Pole ones, he remembered that, but still somewhere cold. He remembered one vacation where the weather had turned and it got unexpectedly hot, and she’d found a cooler and a bag of ice for him. Several times Miles had seen her brushing down his feathers, and yes maybe doing something to his feet - 

“I think she puts something on his feet,” Miles said. “But I thought it was, you know, like makeup or something. Or those face masks she uses.” 

The flamingo daemon honked out what sounded suspiciously like a laugh and Julian hip-checked her back behind him. “Not necessarily. Just keeping him safe, and herself safe.”

“Huh.” Miles glanced down at Sif, who returned his nonplussed look. “I didn’t know,” she replied. “I don’t need anything you don’t need.”

“But the long and short of it is,” Julian continued, “we need to make sure people can have their daemons live safely on the station. Consider it another part of life support, like heat. Now -“ he gestured to the little tank, still turning over disinfected water, “If you find my design acceptable, we should move on to discussions of the saltwater systems for marine daemons.” 

“Certainly,” Miles agreed, although his mind was miles away.

***

The pretty Bajoran bartender smiled at Miles, her odd looking yet colorful daemon tilting his large bill back and forth. “Good evening, Chief! How may I help you?”

“I’m looking to book a session.” Miles felt oddly embarrassed, but irritated more than anything else. The holodecks on the _Enterprise_ had been free access to anyone, so _paying_ for a program felt like extortion. Going off what he’d heard about Quark, he was probably right. 

“Certainly! What type of experience are you looking for?”

“Something _above board_ , nothing cheeky,” he bluntly replied. The bird daemon repressed a noise that may have been a laugh, and Miles scowled. “Can I - oh I don’t know - look through your index of outdoor programs?”

“Of course!” She handed him a PADD. “Scroll through, or search by keyword. Take your time!”

Miles flipped through the list of available excursions. Although a few caught his eye - he would have to revisit the Whitmore Wash trip later - he soon found the section he was looking for, although his finger hovered about the “purchase” button. He handed the tablet back, asked to be excused for a moment, then retreated back towards a quieter part of the bar to comm his wife. 

“Keiko? Hi, honey - no, everything’s fine, I just got out of that meeting with Bashir.”

“Yeah it was fine, actually you might be interested in some of it, but first - yeah. Hey I called to ask, what’s the name of the town where your grandparents lived?... Hagi? Okay, great! We’re not doing anything this evening, right? Alright,

how about you and Molly meet me at Quark’s in 40 minutes?... I promise, it will be fun. Okay, great! Love you.” 

He retuned to the bartender, selected a specific program, and hit enter. “This program, please - bill it to my account… yeah, I’ll wait here.”

Miles settled in at the bar to wait for Keiko. Sif leaned up against his leg, and in a moment of self-indulgence he scooped her up and pressed her to his chest. She licked at his face and he held her tight, distracted. 

There was a moment of silence at the bar, filled in by the cheers at the dabo table and the general chatter of the clientele. Miles opened his mouth to speak, hesitated, then finally murmured, “... _are we_ neglecting your needs?”

“Me? Nah!” The little terrier daemon shook out her fur, as if to prove a point. “ _I_ am okay. That’s not to say we shouldn’t pay more attention to Keiko and Molly.” The daemon turned, to give him a baleful look. “They _are_ here because of us, you know.”

“I know, I know.” Miles sighed, his breath ruffling the little dog’s fur. “And you _know_ I care. It’s just -”

“It’s a lot to express, I know.” Sif paused as a rowdy crowd of Bajorans, celebrating who knows what, passed by the bar. “But we should try. And this day at the beach should be a good start.”

Miles craned his neck towards the front of the bar, and saw Keiko holding Molly, her own daemon waddling in at her side, the pair hesitant in the dingy bar light. Miles caught her eye, enthusiastically waved his wife over.

“I’m trying,” he muttered to his daemon, as his wife picked her way through the crowd to join him. “Isn’t that enough?”

Sif licked at his face. “I never said it wasn’t,” she huffed, tail wagging, and then Keiko and Molly had arrived, and the three - the _six_ \- of them were headed towards the holosuite. The beach program would end up being a surprisingly delightful time for Keiko and Yuki, who took advantage of the cool surf to porpoise in and out of the waves, and Molly built a sand casle with Hiro’s and Sif’s help, and the three humans watched the sun set together. And as much as Miles enjoyed the evening, he still felt the lingering embers of resentment, that _Doctor Bashir_ had been right. He needed to show that brat a lesson.

 _Or,_ he thought, as Keiko settled into his lap to watch the sun set, Yuki preening his bill through Sif’s fur, _send him a thank-you card. One or the other._

He could not decide but, at this moment, with the sun casting iridescent rainbows through Keiko's hair, and Molly chasing waves through the shallow surf, Miles decided he didn't care.

**Author's Note:**

> Miles O'Brien's daemon is a Cairn terrier, a small ratter breed of domestic dog. Cairns are intelligent and high-energy dogs, but can be destructive if not given enough exercise and attention. As Miles is a fairly traditional person, resistant to change and places a lot of value in traditions, an early working dog breed fits his personality and job quite well. (Unfortunately the breed was developed in Scotland, not Ireland.)
> 
> Julian Bashir's daemon is a lesser flamingo, the smallest species in the well-known avian family. Lesser flamingos are remarkably resilient birds who build nests in alkaline lakes and can drink near-boiling hot water without harm. They are extremely social and gregarious, invest a lot of parental care into their chicks, and some birds even try to feed chicks that don't belong to them. Julian is outgoing and flirtatious, deeply concerned with fitting in with everyone else, and cares deeply about his patients - a good match for these unique birds. However, their attractiveness is potentially [up for debate](https://www.oregonzoo.org/sites/default/files/styles/exhibit_photo/public/2013/03/06/H_lesserflamingosflapping.jpg?itok=Om4I-FlI).


End file.
